NJPAC & NJTV Collaborate on New American Songbook Series for Broadcast

NJTV, New Jersey's public television network, and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC) announced the production of a new music television series, American Songbook at NJPAC, taped before a live audience at the Arts Center and airing on NJTV and WNET this fall.

The six-part series, to be taped in NJPAC's intimate Victoria Theater on Saturday, June 15, will feature performances from eight stars of stage, screen and concert halls. Tom Wopat, Valerie Simpson, Rebecca Luker, Sandy Stewart and Bill Charlap, Marin Mazzie and Jason Danieley,and Maude Maggart will each perform a 40-minute set followed by a Q&A session conducted by Ted Chapin, president and executive director of Rodgers & Hammerstein: An Imagen Company.

The series will be crafted from two live performance sessions at NJPAC in Newark, NJ. The first session, at 12pm, will feature Wopat, Simpson and Luker, while the second, at 6pm, will feature Mazzie and Danieley, Stewart and Charlap, and Maggart. The American Songbook performance series at NJPAC is presented, in part, through the generous support of the Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation, and will benefit The Actors Fund.

Tickets are $29 for the each of the American Songbook at NJPAC sessions, and go on sale Friday, May 10 at 10am. Tickets are available by phone at 1-888-466-5722, online www.njpac.org, and at NJPAC's box office at 1 Center Street in Downtown Newark.

"NJTV is committed to giving the arts a broadcast home in New Jersey," said John Servidio, General Manager of NJTV. "Arts programming is intrinsic to the mission of public television, and we are one of the few outlets providing it in the television marketplace. To be able to capture this performance genre with entertainers of this caliber is very exciting. This series will serve as a model we can replicate at other forums to showcase all types of talent across the state."

"NJPAC is delighted to partner again with NJTV, this time on a special series to highlight American Song," said John Schreiber, President and CEO of NJPAC. "This series allows us to deliver unique and compelling content beyond the four walls of the Arts Center with some of America's premier interpreters of song." He added, "To be able to partner with The Actors Fund makes this series even more special."

"When John Schreiber asked me to host the conversations he conceived as part of the television shows to be produced with NJTV/WNET, I was honored," said Ted Chapin. "The American Songbook is endlessly fascinating, and the combination of first rate and focused performances by some of our most talented singers with interviews was too alluring to pass up. I have enjoyed the moderating and interviews I have done through the years and look forward to an action-packed, gloriously musical day at NJPAC in June."

The American Songbook at NJPAC series follows on the success of several recent television tapings and broadcasts from the Arts Center, including Conversations at NJPAC with Steve Adubato and the national broadcasts of NBC's hit America's Got Talent last summer. "NJPAC has proved it is a first choice venue for high-profile teleVision Productions," said Schreiber. "We look forward to more partnerships like these that will continue to expand broadcast opportunities."

For the television tapings, NJPAC will donate tickets to The Actors Fund as a fundraiser for the renowned national human services organization, which helps all professionals in performing arts and entertainment.

"The Actors Fund and the American Songbook go together like peanut butter and jelly," said Joe Benincasa, president & CEO of The Actors Fund, "and so do NJPAC and The Fund." He continued by underscoring the fact that past and current American composers, singers and songwriters have all supported the human services mission of The Fund.

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